Dark City

26.

An hour later they were on the floor in Alex's bedroom, rising and falling toward a ceiling streaked with rainbow dragons. Alex's braided coif has fallen into disarray and she was playing with Lacey's red hair, trying to remember how to braid. Her mind remembered, but her fingers didn't. They nested into Lacey's hair, clawing like fingers on a typewriter. Lacey was her own life-size mermaid Barbie. The more she looked at her, the more like a mermaid she seemed. Alex found a long string of iridescent pearls and draped them around her new friend's neck.

They spoke nonsense back and forth, pressing Alex's crystals to their foreheads and pretending to astral project themselves into other realms. Alex tried to do a shoulder stand and ripped her sleeve. What might have distressed her before only made her laugh now, and inspired a game of dress up. She and Lacey threw all the clothing out of her closet, sifting through vintage couture. They jumped in and out of costume, donning beaded gowns and silk kimonos.

"I love clothes," Alex sighed, "dressing up, becoming someone else for a little while."

"Your clothes are beautiful," Lacey said. She caressed Alex's arm with an albino peacock feather.

"You're so beautiful, Lacey. I wish I could be half as pretty."

"Aww."

"Honestly," Alex stammered, suddenly gloomy, "Next to you, I feel so plain."

"You have nothing to worry about, little cake." Lacey kissed her cheek. She touched the collar of Alex's silk robe and slid it slightly back.

Alex covered herself up, tightening the front of her robe. "Lacey!"

"I could teach you things that would drive Nathan crazy."

"I couldn't. With you?" She giggled and folded her arms. "Nathan and I are over anyway."

"It's normal to be scared, Alex," Lacey said, shrugging off the rejection like rain droplets. "Sex opens you up to an ocean of peril. Emotions. Attachments. Intimacy."

"I feel so bad for it now. Taking his pills."

"Why did you?"

"I thought that if I made him hate me I could be brought into the coven. He wouldn't come looking for me if I disappeared." She held herself around the trunk, feeling sick to her stomach. "Oh, gosh. He must think I'm a horrible, horrible person, Lacey. I didn't know he'd lost his leg. It came off like he was made of wood. I threw up when I saw it. He must have been so ashamed."

"Shit," said Lacey. She took a breath. "Just... wow."

Alex lay down in her bed and stared at her gauzy canopy. "He pushed me," Alex said. The words came spilling out against her will, as if her thoughts were no longer just her own. "He went crazy in the woods when these paintballers showed up. He would have killed one of them if I hadn't fought him. That's how I messed up my eye."

Lazey collapsed beside her and bit her lip. "Play with fire and you're bound to get burned."

"Don't tell anyone."

"I won't."

"Lacey?"

"Hm?"

"Is he real? Baphomet? Please, tell me. That night was the most real thing I've ever felt in my entire life."

Lacey's lips curled into a smirk. "Do you really want to know?"

"Yes."

"Come with me to Litha and you can ask Hypatia for a second chance."

"I thought she was just a girl named Cheyenne."

"She is, but she's still one of the few genuine witches I've ever met. Are you sure you want to follow this path? There's no going back if you do."